Abstract
The focus of this chapter is to illustrate the use of a rodent other than the mouse or rat to serve as a model of an important human disease. This chapter provides limited information on basic species biology and husbandry, and instead concentrates on the research uses of sand rats. Psammomys, or the sand rat, is a rodent belonging to the subfamily Gerbillinae. Diabetes in sand rats ranges from mild hyperglycemia with hyperinsulinemia to hypoinsulinemia with ketoacidosis, which is a terminal stage with short survival. Psammomys are mainly important because it is found to be an intermediate host of the parasite Leishmania tropica, which is transmitted to humans by the sand fly. Psammomys attained additional interest when it was found to be an intermediate host of the parasite Leishmania tropica, which displays a range of phenotypic characteristics, as might be expected for noninbred progeny, when given free access to standard laboratory diet labeled as high-energy (HE) diet (Digestible energy—2.93 kcal/g).
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